April 25, 2010

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Middle East peace envoy George Mitchell wrapped up a three day trip to Israel and the Palestinian Authority today, in an effort to get U.S. mediated proximity talks launched.

Mitchell invited Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to meet President Barack Obama in Washington next month, the AFP reported.

The State Department called Mitchell's talks with Israeli and Palestinian leaders “positive and productive” but indicated there's more work to be done to get the indirect talks started.

Mitchell’s “meetings continued our efforts to improve the atmosphere for peace and for proceeding with proximity talks," State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said in a statement Sunday. Mitchell’s deputy Ambassador David Hale, “will work with the parties this week to prepare for the Special Envoy’s return to the region next week,” he said.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak is flying back with Mitchell to Washington, Ynet reported. Mitchell is expected to return to the region on Friday.

The Palestinians are going to go back to the Arab League for permission on proximity talks likely next week, the American Task Force for Palestine's Hussein Ibish said.

Israeli reports said Abbas did not accept Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s reported offer last week for a provisional Palestinian state with temporary borders encompassing about 60% of West Bank territory.

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Abu Mazen (mahmud abbas) wears an undeserved halo in Washington discourse. Yet, he has a doctorate from a Communist-run university in Moscow, where he produced a thesis in which he minimized the Holocaust. Of course, one would not expect him to admit that the top Palestinian Arab leader of that time, Haj Amin el-Husseini, spent most of the war years in the Nazi-fascist domain. Husseini made radio broadcasts over Radio Berlin to the Middle East, calling on Arabs to "slaughter Jews wherever you find them."
He also used his influence in Berlin and the capitals of Axis satellite states to urge those countries to send Jewish children to Poland, where, he said, they would be "under active supervision."
Abu Mazen is not a moderate in his dealings with Israel. Husseini knew very well that Auschwitz was the destination of most Jews whom the Nazi Germans sent to Poland. The TV, radio, schools, mosques under Abbas' control and influence repeatedly incite hatred against Jews by Arab-Muslims. There is not much difference between Abbas' anti-Jewish hate incitement and that of his Hamas rivals. Moreover, both factions oppose permanent peace with Israel. Hamas offers a short term truce instead. And has just threatened to murder an Israeli prisoner, Gilad Shalit, now in Hamas' hands. Mahmoud Abbas has an undeserved "moderate" reputation, and Mitchell's invitation to him to come to Washington shows disrespect for decency and the highest American principles. Obama and his administration not only refuse to recognize Turkish/Ottoman genocide of Armenians (in which Arab-Muslims also took part). They also encourage Arabs who would commit genocide against Jews.

Abu Mazen is not a moderate because he refuses to recognize a Jewish state in the ME.
Actually there is no such thing as a moderate Arab in the ME. All polls show that about 90% of Arabs reject the existence of a Jewish state. Moreover, the more Arab leaders are extremist and violent, and the most they appreciated and supported.

While I doubt that there will be an noticeable outcome of this proposed meeting, I can't wait to see the warm reception that Abbas will receive from the Obama Administration. Mr. Obama is not the first US President to attempt "peace" but he is certainly setting a new tone with his harsh treatment of Prime Minister Netanyahu and Israel in general. Too bad that Abbas is simply a puppet for the AL, Fatah, and Hamas.

I reckon you three have it all figured.
Now all you have to do is undo years of diplomacy and get the Western world to shun Mahmoud Abbas.
Good luck with that. The fact is, Salem Fayad is busy creating a state in time for the big unilateral declaration that the United States will then promptly recognize.
A solution based on international law and UN resolutions that Israel has violently avoided in favor of rampant colonialism all these years.
So ramble on, the world is moving right on by the wingnuts and taking care of making peace, in spite of Israel's continued intransigence.

to michael hess: the rest of the world "making peace", or the rest of the world desperately wanting to look like peace can imposed from without, kind of like how the u n has "peace keeping" forces that have failed to stop the flow of some 50000 rockets and missiles into lebanon and hezbollah? I "reckon" you got the answer...?

Mark,
Lebanon has every right to defend itself against Israeli aggression.
I reckon you realize that Israel is not the only country that has a right to self-defense.
Israel would be unwise to start yet another pretext war like it did in 2006 when it lost the Second Lebanon War (see the Winograd Report) just because it is unwilling to give up the illegal colonies in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
This same unending scenario by the Israelis has played out for decades.
Start a war, take the world's eyes off of the illegal colonies, and build build build to change the "facts on the ground".
Now just how old is that very phrase and how many wars have been fought and won or lost during all this time and yet Israel is steal stealing more land and resources with complete impunity?
Israel's actions are endangering stability in the Middle East. Thankfully it seems the Obama administration gets it.

so the enforceability of "making peace" which obama is all about (which you referred to above) will be determined by the u n, do you reckon, Michael? Since it was always lebanons "right" anyway (despite cease fire agreements), what other arab "rights" abound that vitiate united nations peace keeping pledges, or world pledges to protect Israel's peace? are you sure we should impose peace?

Arik, Eliyahu, and Mark are clearly either American Israel-Firsters or Israeli Likudniks or both. They close their eyes to Israel's violations of international law with its illegal invasions, occupations and settlement expansions. Israel's illegal acts invite revenge attacks not to mention world hatred. Israel's world popularity is one of the lowest among nations at 19% according to a recent BBC poll. Israel doesn't dare join the NPT and allow UN inspectors in to see its hundreds of nukes because it's afraid of sabotage similar to what it's enacting against the Iranians.

To robert,
Those labels are sidetracks you set up. You use unreflective Israel- bashing hyperbole to raise your supposed chorus of support. To me, this is self-evidently defensiveness in the guise of dogmatic truth. Do you honestly think that occupation is an issue that those that seem to oppose you are unaware of? Or the history of the legality of acts of war? Or the legal status of settlements, and the relevance of law in the justice of the relative claims of the Israelis and Palestinians? Is this the narrow discursive world that you occupy? It's your dogma or the highway... why not reason, Robert? Take the plunge...

Mark,
I take it from your response that you feel all superior in knowing that I am wrong, because it does not fit in with your misconceptions about the realities of the conflict.
Here's the deal. I know that Hamas or any other militant group is committing a war crime when it fires rockets and mortars indiscriminately against civilians.
Just as sure as I can recognize that Israel's restitution payment to the UN of $10.5 million made just before the UN vote on Richard Goldstone's report gives the report a good bit of validation in itself.
Israel is at a real crossroads here. It has to decide whether maintaining 500,000 thousand illegal colonists on Palestinians land is going to be sustainable.
It should be self-evident to all, it is not.
Otherwise you would not mind if I build half of my new garage on your property, and if you dare utter a peep I get out weapons of mass destruction and armored bulldozers...
You would just cower as you expect the Palestinians to do right?

hi again, michael,
you said in your first post, "the world is moving on and making peace, in spite of diplomacy," in effect. you made this point as if this outcome is somehow to be preferred, and this is coming to be inevitable, and is somehow fitting, by your 'reckoning". If the world makes this peace independent of one or both of the parties full assent, as reflected in deliberate unforced accords, my questions are, who will enforce it justly, competently, and in a trustworthy way, and how much will it cost per year, and who pays, and how can the parties trust that such an accord is enforced year in and year out despite political and economic changes---in my opinion these are fair questions to be asked, and i earlier raise the issue of the united nations complete failure to keep its peace keeping pledge in lebanon as a first glaring relevant example of the precariousness of that plan. I must admit i found you smugly and glibly putting this plan as if israel, especially deserved it, but without bringing up these relevant and brain teasing questions... who me superior?? well, maybe a little...not really. thank you if you really answer these questions which i think are real and considerable difficulties.

Mark,
It's OK. I don't really have time to play with you. You might have read, there are a whole host of paid bloggers getting checks from the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs to fill up blogs like these with inane comments that are just to obfuscate what is really going on.
Israel has illegally transferred 500,000 colonists OUTSIDE of their internationally recognized borders.
These illegal colonists require a huge occupation army to keep them safe from the people they are taking the land from.
Imagine. How odd. Why should these people be upset?
Feel free to act as if the Palestinians are not entitled to the paltry 22% of the original Mandate that they are prepared to settle for including the ENTIRE Arab world unanimously through that Arab League.
Peace will just drive around you.

a good dodge, michael. it doesn't really work at all. my responses to you don't merit your condescending defensive self righteous accusation that i am hired by the israeli government, and then YOU go on, not to deal with the article, and my challenges to your contention, but rather to participate in simple rhetorical israel bashing. i thought you were a worthier antagonist, michael.
mark

michael,
reading other posts of yours i've come to see that you actually don't seek to reply to serious arguments against your views, but rather loosely assemble a series of "factoids" and intone more or less the same litany of complaints always against israel, time and again---and you call me a "shill.!" truth is i'm a piano tuner, knife sharpener, saxophonist, and social worker (now THAT's hard to believe!), but dont belong to any organization furthering israels interests.

Robert, you are a living proof that supporters of Arab genocidal jihad are using a Commie style propaganda. Being opposed to Arab genocidal project is legitimate, supporting Muslim supremacists is a shame.

Sunday, April 25, 2010
National Security Adviser Jones: Jews Are Greedy Merchants
As the National Security Adviser, General James Jones is not known as a friend of the Jewish State. It was Jones who put together the team of Brent Scowcroft and Zbigniew Brzezinski to meet with the President and advise him to impose a solution on Israel.
Earlier this week we may have gotten some insight into why Jones is not a fan of the Jewish Homeland. He was giving the key note speech at a Washington Institute For Near East Policy and started it out with a "Joke" that borders on anti-Semitic, teaching the crowd that Jews are just greedy merchants in the same vein as Shakespeare's Shylock:
A Taliban militant gets lost and is wandering around the desert looking for water. He finally arrives at a store run by a Jew and asks for water. The Jewish vendor tells him he doesn’t have any water but can gladly sell him a tie. The Taliban, the jokes goes on, begins to curse and yell at the Jewish storeowner. The Jew, unmoved, offers the rude militant an idea: Beyond the hill, there is a restaurant; they can sell you water. The Taliban keeps cursing and finally leaves toward the hill. An hour later he’s back at the tie store. He walks in and tells the merchant: “Your brother tells me I need a tie to get into the restaurant.”
According to the Jewish Forward
After the speech, two participants suggested, in private conversations with the Forward, that Jones’ joke might have been inappropriate. After all, making jokes about greedy Jewish merchants can be seen at times as insensitive.
A prominent think-tank source who attended the event said the joke was “wrong in so many levels” and that it “demonstrated a lack of sensitivity.” The source also asked: “Can you imagine him telling a black joke at an event of African Americans?”
Was the Joke Anti-Semitic? Well, the White House must have thought so. The White House transcript sent to reporters after the event conveniently began a couple of minutes into the speech. The video of the event posted on the Washington Institute Web site started right after the Joke, you can even hear the end of the laughter.
Its interesting that the same President that see racism in the legitimate actions of the Cambridge Police and the State of Arizona, hides the anti-Semitic prose of its National Security Adviser.
UPDATE: Thanks to the folks at Breitbart TV, I was able to get my hands on the video of Jones' comic delivery (if you cant see video below click here)

Irrespective of what you say against Abbas, even if true, does not negate the fact that America has to take more affirmative actions to impose a two state solution. The vast majority of the international community supports a two state solution based on the 67' borders which is the only real solution in the end. America's unconditional support of Israel is not in the best interest of our country, its soldiers or security. America needs to put its own interest first.

Posted By: Irrespective of what you say against Abbas, even if true, does not negate the fact that America has | April 26, 2010 at 07:27 AM

Mark,
In twenty years on the Internet, nineteen of them as a news editor, I can see a snow job a mile away old son.
Never once have you acknowledged the human rights abuses of the Israelis against the Palestinians, even as I have denounced Palestinian militants rockets as war crimes.
If you cannot even start from the same baseline, that ALL human rights violations, both those y Israel and other militant actors in the region are to be treated as equally wrong under the rule of law, then it really is not me with the problem.

The article you commented upon wasn't about war crimes, and equivalency of the morality of the parties. Your comment several posts ago made a claim about the adviseability of the world "making peace" regardless of the willingness of both parties to agree, or even to participate. My very first opposing argument you have never directly answered, preferring instead to bash Israel for other reasons. Fine, but that's your illogic, Mr. Editor.

Mark,
I answered you quite directly on Lebanon and on the core reason there is no peace; illegal Israeli colonies placed outside of Israel's internationally recognized borders and the brutal military occupation force used to enforce it.
You chose to provide yet another one of those smoky non-answers where you refuse to address what I wrote, you go off on a tangent and just make things up:
"...what other arab "rights" abound that vitiate united nations peace keeping pledges, or world pledges to protect Israel's peace?"
Mark, I simply don't have time to address such made up nonsense.
If you cannot address the core issues in a rational and factual way you are simply wasting your time with those who are more informed.

Michael,
I know I've got you on the run, and have for a while.
Your time is as precious as your truthfulness, in my opinion. You are incapable of responding to this simple question, I fear: "Using the example of the the u.n. peace=keeping force which let into lebanon 50000 smuggled missile, despite its peace keeping pledge, and agreements by the world to keep this from happening, who do we trust to keep any peace between the israelis and palestinians which is imposed upon the pair from third parties? Simple question which was not about the "core" of the lebanon question, but rather a simple case in point about trustablility of peace keepers.

Mark,
Can you really be that obtuse? Lebanon has the right to defend itself. Case closed. Its munitions are immaterial.
Bibi himself walked back on the threat to wage war on Damascus and by extension on Hezbollah this afternoon in his Monday meeting with Likud members of the Knesset.
You seem to have a basic reading comprehension problem, and you are behind on current events.
And you cannot bring yourself to face the true core issues, the illegal occupations, the violations of human rights, and the very same warmongering that Bibi finds himself walking back on today, in front of the Likud faction of the Knesset no less!
The world is passing you by Mark. When you cannot even acknowledge the most basic of facts and you don't even know what is going on in Israel, why embarrass yourself?

Mark piles one lie on top of another, so it's hard to keep up. What, pray tell, Mark, does Lebanon have to do with Jewish settlements in Judea-Samaria, that you call "colonies"?? These settlements are not in Lebanon. Further, it wasn't so much Lebanon that was at war with Israel in 2006 but the Hizbullah, a fanatical Shiite gang that has imposed itself on Lebanon with the help and sponsorship of Syria and Iran. Are you unaware that Syria is a bloody dictatorship? That Syria has a long-standing practice of murdering Lebanese leaders who don't want to play ball with Syria, who want Lebanon to be independent of Syria?? Do you know about Rafiq Hariri, Kamal Jumblatt, Ghassan Tueini, Samir Kassir, Bashir Gemayel, Rene Mu`awad? They were all Lebanese leaders and journalists, victims of murder by Syrian agents, as were many others? So Syria controls Lebanon and Hizbullah is one of its instruments. The Hizb started the war with Israel in 2006, not because of Jewish settlements but because it wants to destroy all of Israel. If you want self-determination for those Arabs now fashionably called "Palestinians," why not self-determination for Lebanon (without Syrian control)? Judea-Samaria are parts of the ancient Jewish homeland. Why should Israel not have those areas? Further, the League of Nations recognized the Jewish National Home in 1922 which included all of today's Israel, including Judea-Samaria. Moreover, you write about "1967 borders." Israel had no agreed borders before 1967 since the Arab states refused to make peace with Israel on any borders. Israel had only armistice lines in 1967. Since the Jewish National Home has remained in effect since 1920 San Remo, there is no Israeli "occupation" of Judea-Samaria, parts of the internationally designated Jewish National Home. The Jewish settlements in Judea-Samaria are legal for that reason. Even if those areas were "occupied," Art. 49 of Geneva IV does not forbid Jews to move there of their own free will, which is what Jews did. Read Geneva IV and learn. Stop repeating the lies.

Eliyahu,
San Remo does no such thing and you know it. How many times has it been explained to you that Israel derives its rights from the 1947 Partition Plan and not San Remo?
If you are going to come on strong to Mark, you should at least be factual.
San Remo did not have a thing to do with setting borders or any other such nonsense, that was the Partition Plan.
Imagine your chutzpah! What reason do you put forward for Ban Ki-Moon unequivocally making clear that ALL of the colonies are illegal if they were not all illegal?
Why is this the official position of the US, the British, the EU, and the rest of the international community?
Do you imagine that they have not heard, and dismissed out of hand, your nonsense about San Remo before?

Michael H, Israel's rights derive from the Jewish history in the Land of Israel since ancient times. The San Remo Decision of the Principal Allied Powers (UK, France, Japan & Italy) in 1920 incorporated the 1917 Balfour Declaration into international law. The Balfour Declaration, echoed by French & Italian declarations, called for the Land of Israel ("Palestine" in Western parlance) to be the Jewish National Home. Michael, read the San Remo decision before telling me again that I am wrong. The League of Nations endorsed this decision in 1922 on the grounds of the Jewish history in the Land of Israel ("palestine" in Western parlance). The League called for the UK to foster "close settlement" of Jews on the land (article 6 of the Mandate). The decision was endorsed by several subsequent international instruments, including the Anglo-American Convention on Palestine. The UN charter confirmed the Jewish National Home in 1945 (Article 80). The 1947 Partition Plan was a mere General Assembly recommendation that was rejected by the Arab side. Hence, the Jewish National Home status remained in place. As to Ban Ki-Moon, I know what he said. He was wrong. Would his falsehood be the first time that a UN official or UN body had lied against Israel?? Yes, the UK, EU and other Judeophobic and/or self-interested states pandering to Arab oil monarchies call Jewish settlements "illegal" despite Article 6 of the Mandate document of the League. The US position differs from that of other powers. The US does not say that settlements are "illegal" but that they are not "helpful" to peace or an obstacle to peace -- but does not call them "illegal." It is true that San Remo did not set borders for Jewish National Home but later in 1920, a British-French surveying team did draw up borders that included part of the Golan Heights. On this whole issue of the international law status of Judea-Samaria, I recommend a recent book by Attorney Howard Grief. The book is probably available through Barnes & Noble, Amazon, Borders, etc.

eliyahu, this is mark, the guy you accused of piling up lies...
Exactly where did i even once use the word "colonies?" Check it out. Glad you showed up--- your first sentence contains an unvarnished lie. You must be very good at spotting lies... Michael, take care of this guy will you?

Eyliahu, of course, you are forgiven, and thank you for your contributions as well.
I wrote another post which arrived before receiving your apology, and it is a bit tense. . sorry, to you, and michael for my sarcastic referrence to him.
mark

Eliyahu,
Far more learned than I have pointed out to you the truth.
Again, if there was even a chance it could be the truth then why, what reason do you give, for every world leader for decades seeing it quite differently?
Tell you what, get Ban Ki-Moon to sign on and then people will take you seriously. What next, would you like to rescind UNSCR 181?
Does that one mean anything to you?
How about the actual geographical size of Jerusalem the day before 1967 and its size Israel claims today?
This is 2010. The crap you have been arguing for years has been beaten into the dirt with the facts for years.
What on earth will it take to get you to move into the 21st century where today's reality resides, instead of some fantasy interpretation of old agreements that you cling to far in the past?

Michael H, you really do have to do a lot more studying of the elementary historical facts. You refer to a UNSCR 181. You probably meant the UN General Assembly res. 181 of 29 November 1947, which recommended the Partition Plan. If you read the UN charter, Articles 10 to 14, you will learn that all General Assembly resolutions on political issues are mere recommendations, not law and not binding. The Arab side rejected that proposal and it could be no more than a dead letter. Now as to the borders recommended by UN GA res. 181, they show Jerusalem as an internationally governed enclave, called a corpus separatum in the Partition Plan. It included much land around Jerusalem, including Bethlehem, Beyt Sahur and Beyt Jala to the south of the city so as to bring more Christians into the internationally governed enclave. Why, by the way, would the UN have wanted to exclude Arabic-speaking Christians from the proposed Arab state and put them in an internationally governed Jerusalem enclave??

Good news for the world, but bad news for the greedy pro-settler pigs well represented on this blog by Mark, Arik, Eliyahu, it looks like the peace talks are resuming. For the sake of America's future, we have to end Israel's atrocities and war crimes against humanity.